Gold Panning with mercury
The volcano's western foothills look rather sorry, composed largely of dry shrubland with a few stunted trees. During the wet season upland rice is grown, but the soils are eroded and poor. The few villages exude poverty, although many of their inhabitants are involved in small-scale gold mining. The mines are illegal that proof has been obtained that approval of a single environmental assessment management plan. fortune trees are dug by hand to transport the alluvial mud and the lack of appropriate reinforcements makes them extremely dangerous. The mercury is then used to merge the grains and nuggets of gold in the mud.
The miners are poorly paid for their efforts, a very familiar model in small-scale mining, such as gold most of the profits usually go to the organizers, investors, traders and suppliers of tools and other inputs. A problem in the classical world. During the gold rush in California (1848-1855) for example, the San Francisco businessman Levi Strauss benefited greatly from the sale of the canvas for tents and denim overalls to minors; it is probably here that he developed ideas for blue jeans from the popular Levi.
I came to the region by accident during a Sunday release, when I had stupidly lost my way and had stumbled on a mine shaft. An old friendly man showed the way to return to the main road. But before I went on my way, I asked if he worked in the mine. "Sometimes," he replied, "In the past, every day. Now I'm too old. It is very hot and uncomfortable there, and dangerous. Only last week the mine of my collapsed nearby, killing two inside. "
" But is it worth it? is there gold in these hills? "
" Oh yes, there are gold, enough to keep us busy. but its price has not increased for a long time. the merchant always a reason to pay more for transport and for chemicals we need. There is not much we can do here, so we must accept it. "and then he told me to wait as he wanted to show me a gold coin he had found. It was a little nugget shaped like a small crown cap. If there's gold in those hills, it should also be a bit in the river!
The following week, with two friends we went to try our luck at gold panning. After two hours and no gold, just like we wanted to give up and enjoy some fried bananas made by his wife, a little boy appeared with a wok beat-up. After some turmoil, he shouted: "Grandpa, is this gold" We all went on to have a look, and yes, there it was, a little nugget shaped like a small crown cap? someone must have taught the old man how to raise interest and promote the operation, or perhaps it was his own idea.
When I returned with my friends we got lost again and never made the tree. so I've never heard that my brilliant advice was implemented. Obviously, I can not direct you to the place, as I can not even find myself. it is west of Bogor district, north of Mt. Salak National Park Halimun Who knows, if you manage somehow to get there, the following simple instructions will help you with panoramic.
- First, fill your pot nearly full of sand and gravel. Remove the larger stones of the pan.
- Place the pan under water and make sure that all equipment is wet. You may have to mix the contents of the pan with your hands.
- quickly move the pan from side to side, either under water or while it is full of water, and rotate the contents of the pan (but not spill the contents) . This action gives gold particles a chance to settle to the bottom.
- While continuing the side to side motion, gently tilt the pan away from you. material lighter and bigger pieces that come up moves to the front of the pan. These can be skimmed or scraped over the edge of the pan with the thumb or hand.
- Continue the movement described in steps 3 and 4, allowing water to wash lighter materials on the edge until only a small amount of material left in the pan. You will need to add water to the pan.
- The remaining heavy material is concentrated. If you have not yet seen the gold in your pan, pour the excess water until enough is left to barely cover the concentrate. Shake the pan contents "string" or "feather" the concentrate. lighter particles are washed away as the heavier particles, leaving the gold (because it is heavier) in the "tail" of the concentrate.
- Continue swirling water in the pan to clean more concentrated, being careful not to lose the gold. Recovery of gold by panning takes practice!
Quite a complicated process and takes time!
minors "professional" thus tend to accelerate the process using mercury to amalgamate gold grains. Rather than picking up the mud banks, they dig trees decompose or alluvial deposits with high pressure water jets. This has certainly increased their productivity, but at a high environmental cost - downstream of mining water from the river is brown silt and highly toxic mercury
mine Grasberg
This is not only the problem faced by individuals on the micro-scale of a few dollars a day, but also on a mega-scale by large mining companies such as Freeport Grasberg in Papua province, which is the largest gold mine in the world and the third largest copper mine. It consists of a large open pit mine and an underground mine. The first is visible from space as the surface its crater is more than a mile wide. And despite the costs-the very high investment mine is located between 2,500 and 4,000 meters above sea level, which requires complex technological problems to solve-the mine is a low-cost operation.
And as with small-scale mining [illegal], the environmental effects are considerable. Some 230,000 tonnes of tailings are generated each wash day in the river Aikwa affecting areas-not surprisingly plain that fish have nearly disappeared from the river. But Freeport says its emissions meet regulatory requirements. Those in favor of the transaction exit point that the Grasberg mine has 19,500 employees and is the largest taxpayer in Indonesia ($ 1.4 billion in 09).
It is interesting to note that the production of about 60 tonnes Grasberg is lower than the estimated 65 100 tonnes produced in 2013 by 1,000,000 illegal miners in Indonesia some 850 mining areas spread of Aceh in west Papua in the east.
these production volumes and revenues derived justify the environmental and social costs will depend on a view. But it is clear that those who do the hard and dangerous work are compensated the least.
0 Komentar